The Week That Was

I took some time off this week. I could say I was being productive, well sort of. I read, I shopped for Xmas. and I got caught up in playing an online multiplayer role playing game; Fallen Sword.

In other words besides being busy at work I goofed off instead of blogging. Mind you that does not mean I did not pay attention to the wonderful world of politics this week. And so I will do a little update here of the week that was. Or at least my interpretation of it.

LIARS CLUB

Well after hearing Karlheinz Schrieber tell his side of the cash for Thiesen weapons systems story, apparently paying off Brian Mulroney after he left office but making the deal while he was in office. It got all very complicated. Before the Star Chamber of the Ethics Committee of Parliament Schrieber insisted that the Liberals had been wrong all along. As had Stevie Cameron. It had nothing to do with Air Bus. Nope it was all about Thiesen and their Light Armoured Vehicles that they wanted to manufacture in the Maritimes. It was about weapons. And Mulroney took cold hard cash to promote weapons. A weapons system that he himself kaboshed when it turned out that it would cost taxpayers a 100 million dollars.

So this week BM showed up before the Star Chamber and contradicted Schrieber. He didn't get $300,000 in thousand dollar bills, he got $225,000. And he kept $75,000, the initial retainer, in a safety deposit box. But he did eventually declare and pay taxes on $300,000. He did meet Schrieber twice while in office, once for coffee at 24 Sussex Drive and once at his PM get away cabin. But shucks that was just a social call, anyone of us could have visited him.

The whole thing showed that both these characters are liars and scoundrels. It just so happens that one of them was once the PM. The other a gun runner.

Now anywhere else in the world a gun runner putting a PM of a country on a retainer to sell weapons would raise an eyebrow or two.

But not in Canada. And it wasn't about Airbus. At least they both agreed on that. Nope it was about Theisen and promoting LAV's. And the deal was cooked up while Mulroney was still in office but concluded once he left. And with cold hard cash there is no paper trail.

Now lets not forget that this was the same Brian Mulroney who got appointed a director of Archer Daniel Midlands, and that company was plagued with a price fixing scandal at the time. And low and behold if ADM didn't buy out Robin Hood Mills of Canada, thanks to Mulroney's FTA with Reagan.

Thats the kind of guy Mulroney is and was. So we should be shocked that he would be a gunzel for a gunrunner?

CTV YOUR BIAS IS SHOWING

For weeks prior to and finally the week of the Star Chamber revelations of Karl and Brian, Craig Oliver of CTV Question Period and Mike Duffy sounded like Conservative hacks. First they complained this was all old news. Then as revelations were made by Karl, Mike dismissed them. Both of them characterized the hearings as a clown show. In fact they insisted, despite facts proving it was anything but, on reporting it as such. Now what got their knickers in a twist?

Surprising and shocking revelations that came from Karl as reported on all the other channels became irrelevant ramblings according Mike. He spent more time dismissing Karl than the Conservatives did.

SMOKE AND MIRRORS

Wednesday the Taser report on the RCMP was released but it was lost in all the news coverage of the 'Waiting For Brian' Story. On Thursday as the Mulroney Royal Entourage came before the Star Chamber, the Conservatives finally released their Pavier Report on Polling.

Remember that. Well this could be why they delayed the report and then released it on the day Brian was testifying. Tories spend more on polling now than Liberals did
Meanwhile Stockwell Day was nowhere to be found on Parliament Hill. Neither Wednesday when the damning Taser Report came out, calling it a lethal weapon.

RCMP watchdog demands tougher rules on Tasers
Canadians 10 times more likely to be Tasered to Death by Police then Americans

Nor was he around on Friday when the RCMP Investigation Report came out.

Task force says RCMP should be 'separate entity'


RCMP JUST ANOTHER PUBLIC SERVICE

The Task Force revealed that the RCMP is just another group of public sector workers. Yes there was the usual media and pundit comments about the iconic nature of the RCMP, blah, blah. But when you look closely at the report you see that the RCMP is no different than any other public sector workers. They are over worked, putting in unpaid overtime. The force has allocated for increased staffing but never hired personnel. RCMP officers are doing data entry that should have been done by data entry clerks, but of curse those positions were never filled. Working Alone is dangerous for most workers, and many provinces have Working Alone legislation. Of course the RCMP deaths recently in the North shows that these workers share something in common with their civilian counterparts. Due to cost savings, the bottom line, they are put in the way of danger that has ended up with fatalities. Cost cutting, cutbacks, unfilled positions are all the legacy of the neo-con attack on the public sector in the nineties. And the RCMP are public sector workers just like their civilian counterparts. The report talks about the need for civilian oversight, for making the RCMP autonomous and giving them access to the the oversight commission for complaints. What it failed to recommend was a real grievance procedure and an authentic new form of staff relations, that is they failed to recommend unionization of the RCMP.

CSIS BEAT THEM TO IT

The revelation that the CIA destroyed waterboarding torture tapes reminded me that CSIS did the same thing with its wire tapping of the Air India conspirators twenty years ago. Nice to know Canada leads the way. Of course the CIA says it did it to protect the identities of its agents. Did CSIS do it for the same reason?

HYUK, HYUK, IT'S HUCKABEE

As your faithful wag predicted here Huckabee has come from the second tier to be a real threat to the leading Republican Presidential Candidates. That's because they believed their own press. While Huckabee appeals directly to the base of the party. He is one of them. And while he is he is also a Red Tory. A socially liberal politician in right wing garb. The Republican establishment hates him and have begun attacking him, as have media pundits like MSNBC Chris Matthews, that reminds us Huckabee endorses the Second Amendment because folks need guns to protect themselves from the Government. Watch for more smears as Huckabee support rallies in Iowa.

On the Sunday Talk Shows south of the Border the has been McCain who polls below Paul sometimes and is neck and neck with Thompson for falling out of the top tier, is being lauded as the guy who will win New Hampshire. Don't count on it. I predict given New Hampshire's libertarian bent that Paul will surprise folks more than any McCain comeback. After all he raised $3 million dollars online, in one day. A record for any politician. And that money makes him richer than McCain. As for Thompson, glad he didn't give up his acting career.

As for Democrats, Iowa will go to the guy who looks like JFK and talks like RFK. No not Obama, John Edwards. He has the machine in the state, and is everyone's number two choice. In Iowa being number two makes you number one in the caucus's and he has the organization to pull it off. Look for an upset.

PATRIARCHY KILLS

The death of teenage girl in Toronto made headlines. Her father allegedly killed her for being, well a Canadian teenager. You see she rejected her 'religious' faith. Or at least the symbol of womens oppression in that faith.The headscarf. No she wasn't Amish. She was a Muslim. Heck she could have been Christian or Jewish, or a Hindu. It matters not. These are all patriarchal religions who believe in the Father God, and God is the Father. Hence women and children and animals remain chattel to the husband. Secular, pluralist society is being besieged by the identity politics of the oppressors. Thousands of years of religious oppression led to the enlightenment and the revolutionary modernism. Today the forces of humanism face a determined opposition from those who would proclaim their backwards anti-human morality as justified in the name of cultural understanding and inclusiveness. Religion is Political, and always has been, and the battle for freedom is about freedom from religion, not just freedom for religion. Those who would claim that it is only Islam that is intolerant should look to their own holy books, to the divisions between men and women in their synagogues, temples, and churches that exist today. This could have happened to any teenage girl in Canada whose parents are religious zealots. In fact it is the reason we also have young girls and women having babies while denying they are pregnant, which has often ended in tragedy.


There we go a week of rants in one day.




Find blog posts, photos, events and more off-site about:
Canada, government, Conservatives, Stephen Harper, Brian Mulroney,
Harper, Airbus Affair, Karlheinz Schreiber, Stevie Cameron, William Kaplan, CTV, GlobeandMail,
Canada, anti-terrorism act, Government, Liberals, NDP, Conservatives, War Measures Act, 1970, Arar, terrorism, crime, liberalism, state, statism, libertarian, civil liberties
Air, India,, John, Marshall,, RCMP,, CSIS,, Sikh,
Giuliano Zaccardelli, Zaccardelli, , RCMP, Resigns, Arar, Commisioner, Harper, Government, lawandorder, Conservatives, Parliament, MPs, Liberals,
Religion, babuskhka, Headscarves, Veils, Hajib, Patriarchy, Women, Church, Muslim, Catholic, Islam, burqa,
black bloc, Muslim, voting, Quebec, elections canada, Burka, Bikini, Damascus, Syria, feminism, Islam, women, liberation, empowerment
Religion, babuskhka,Headscarves, Veils, Hajib, Patriarchy, Women, Muslim, Islam,

Because They Ain't White

Terror victims receive little government aid: report

While the old Reform Party and its incarnations as the Canadian Alliance and now the Conservative party of Canada, made victims rights a key in their law and order platform, the majority of the victims lobby are of course white. And they speak English. Others need not apply.

Especially those who face state terror. Which was why Maher Arar had to sue the Canadian Government.



Find blog posts, photos, events and more off-site about:
Conservatives, Quebec, PQ, federalism, Canada, Conservatives, multiculturalism, bilingualism, unilingualism, Stephen Harper, nationalism,
multiculturalism, visible-minorities, immigration, immigrants, bilingualism-bicultrualism,hyphenated-Canadians, melting-pot, Cultural-Mosaic, white, people-of-colour, poltics, Canada, government, Canada, anti-terrorism act, Government, Liberals, Conservatives, terrorism, crime, liberalism, state, statism, libertarian, civil liberties
Air, India,, John, Marshall,, RCMP,, CSIS,, Sikh, , Mulroney,

Air India and the Conservatives

The Air India tragedy lays at the feet of our last Conservative government under then PM Brian Mulroney. A not unimportant political fact.

It was then covered up by the Liberals, whom were indebted to the RCMP for being the political guard dogs of the State; burning barns in Quebec, deporting Leonard Peltier, etc. etc.

And while the gnu Conservative government put in place the public inquiry, they had no choice after Bob Rae's report to the Liberal government on their screw up. And like their Liberal predecessors they continue to cover up for the RCMP.

But it was the Conservative government of the day that screwed up. Chickens, home, roost.

From day one the Air India bombing was seen as an Indian affair, not a Canadian one. The racism that led to this tragedy and its cover up is now finally seeing the light of day.

The fact Mulroney first called Gandhi to express condolences on the loss of life on the plane when most of the passengers were Canadians has long been criticised.

Find blog posts, photos, events and more off-site about:
Canada, anti-terrorism act, Government, Liberals, Conservatives, terrorism, crime, liberalism, state, statism, libertarian, civil liberties
Air, India,, John, Marshall,, RCMP,, CSIS,, Sikh, , Mulroney,

Racist Canadian Mounted Police

The RCMP has always had a racial prejudice against Indians....even before the Air India bombing.

The Air-India bombing was viewed for too long as an Indian affair instead of a Canadian tragedy, Bob Rae said Sunday, in his first public comments since new testimony revealed a warning that terrorists were targeting the doomed flight.

That racism impacts how they treat Aboriginal peoples as well as Indian immigrants, and other visible minorities, even today.


Find blog posts, photos, events and more off-site about:
Canada, anti-terrorism act, Government, Liberals, Conservatives, terrorism, crime, liberalism, state, statism, libertarian, civil liberties
Air, India,, John, Marshall,, RCMP,, CSIS,, Sikh,

Gimme More Public Inquiries

The Air India public inquiry shows why we need one into recent RCMP scandals and not Government appointed inquiries.

Inquiry highlights inter-agency issues: Rae

"I think what the public is hearing, perhaps in an abrupt way, is what I think has been pretty clear to people who have studied this for a long time -- that there really was a problem of communication between different levels of government, different departments, agencies, the RCMP and CSIS," Rae told CTV's Mike Duffy Live on Friday.

With new information emerging from the inquiry, critics have wondered if race played a part in how authorities handling the case.

Asked if she thought the information Bartleman provided to the RCMP would have been treated differently if the plane was filled with whites, NDP MP Alexa McDonough said she felt it was a factor.

"I wish it weren't true. But I do think it's true," McDonough told Mike Duffy. "I also think it's shocking that as we pushed and pushed for an inquiry...they kept saying there's no need for an inquiry there's no new information there's nothing more to be learned.

"That turns out not to be true. It's an utter horror story, and thank goodness there is now a full public inquiry underway that can get to the bottom of this."

Shock, outrage and more questions

Their outrage was palpable. Family members of those killed in the Air-India disaster have been trying for more than 20 years to find out what happened at the time of the mid-air bombing.

Yesterday, they heard that days before it occurred, the RCMP brushed off information from an electronic intercept suggesting an Air-India flight had been targeted for the coming weekend.

"It's absolutely incredible," Prakash Sahu, who had a father, stepbrother and stepsister on the flight, said yesterday in an interview from Montreal. "This makes a mockery of what the RCMP were doing."

He was upset it took so long for someone to say publicly what many family members believed for so many years. He wondered why the Mounties have failed to bring those responsible for the bombings to justice. "They should have solved this long ago," he said from London, Ont.

The government resisted calls for a public inquiry for years by "hiding behind the criminal investigation," Mr. Paliwal said. He praised former Supreme Court judge John Major, who heads the inquiry. "We have a lot of confidence in him," he said.

Articles referenced;

RCMP Terror

New Math

Why The Tories Want Tory Judges

More Foreign Affairs Incompetency

Statist Anti-Terrorism Act

Find blog posts, photos, events and more off-site about:
Canada, anti-terrorism act, Government, Liberals, NDP, Conservatives, War Measures Act, 1970, Arar, terrorism, crime, liberalism, state, statism, libertarian, civil liberties
Air, India,, John, Marshall,, RCMP,, CSIS,, Sikh,
Giuliano Zaccardelli, Zaccardelli, , RCMP, Resigns, Arar, Commisioner, Harper, Government, lawandorder, Conservatives, Parliament, MPs, Liberals,

Another Sad Day

They said they needed the Anti-Terrrorism Act to get to the truth of the Air India bombings, which would give them the right to arbitrary arrest and imprisonment of Canadians for information.

Well we don't need that since the Air India inquiry has exposed that the Keystone Kops are incompetent.

Red tape stymied CSIS surveillance, Air India inquiry told



ind blog posts, photos, events and more off-site about:
Canada, anti-terrorism act, Government, Liberals, NDP, Conservatives, War Measures Act, 1970, Arar, terrorism, crime, liberalism, state, statism, libertarian, civil liberties
Air, India,, John, Marshall,, RCMP,, CSIS,, Sikh,
Giuliano Zaccardelli, Zaccardelli, , RCMP, Resigns, Arar, Commisioner, Harper, Government, lawandorder, Conservatives, Parliament, MPs, Liberals,

Why You Need Public Inquiries

The Conservatives refuse to hold any further public inquiries around RCMP wrong doing or their Afghan Detainee situation this may be the reason why. And I have reported on the Communications Security Establishment and their secret spying operation; Echelon.

A former career diplomat - now the lieutenant-governor of Ontario - says he saw intelligence just days before the Air India bombing indicating the airline was about to be attacked.

James Bartleman told a public inquiry Thursday the information came in the form of an electronic intercept from the top-secret Communications Security Establishment, an arm of the Defence Department.

He said the material suggested Air India was being targeted for the coming weekend - the weekend that Flight 182 did indeed go down with the loss of 329 lives.

Bartleman, who was then head of the intelligence and security branch at Foreign Affairs, acknowledged that the intercept was "raw, unevaluated" intelligence that hadn't been checked out.

And he noted there had been so many erroneous alarms raised in the previous year that "I suppose it would be possible for someone to say this is just another one of those cry-wolf events."

But Bartleman recalled he was worried enough to take the written report about the intercept to an RCMP officer and asked if he'd seen it.

"His response startled me. He flushed and told me that of course he had seen it, and that he didn't need me to tell him how to do his job."

The Justice Department says it hasn't been able to locate any such document or to confirm the story with any other potential witness.

But Bartleman insisted he remembers the incident clearly. He said he hasn't come forward until now because he always assumed the RCMP already knew all about anything he had to say.

The startling revelation, if accurate, contradicts one of the most widely repeated mantras about the 1985 bombing - that authorities had no advance warning of a specific and detailed nature about a particular flight being targeted.

SEE:

Repeated Cover ups by Mounted Police

State Security Is A Secure State

ind blog posts, photos, events and more off-site about:
Echelon, CSIS, Spying, Canada, Day, Government, Conservatives, CSE, Canadian-Security-Establishment, DND, Air, India, terrorism, national-security, NARUS, NSA, Bush, CIA

RCYA

Further proof that RCMP Commissioner 'Cover Yer Ass' Zaccardelli was an incompetent administrator who has a penchant for perjury.....as if we needed anymore proof....

Former RCMP commission Giuliano Zaccardelli told the Commons justice committee in 2004 that the forensic lab services matched the best in the world, that it had no backlog and that all cases involving violent crimes were given priority and that its clients — police forces and prosecutors were satisfied.

"Our audit found many of these claims to be incorrect," Fraser stated, adding that the most of the same problems found in the audit were raised in 1990 and 2000. "It is disappointing to find them still unresolved," she told reporters.

The auditor general said the fact is that for 99 per cent of its cases it is unable to meet its own turnaround target of 30 days, partly due to its backlog of DNA requests, which on average take 114 days to complete in 2005-06. However, when pressed, it can turn around urgent service request in 15 days, but this only happens in about one per cent of the cases.

Former RCMP Commissioner Guiliano Zaccardelli told a Parliamentary committee in 2004 that there was no backlog at his force's forensic services and that DNA analysis for major cases was completed within 15 days.

But a report released yesterday by Auditor-General Sheila Fraser says there is a backlog, it is growing, and fewer than one per cent of DNA samples sent to the RCMP Forensic Laboratory Services are processed in less than two weeks.

The rest, including homicides and sexual assaults languished in the lab for an average of 114 days in 2005-06, Ms. Fraser said in her report released Tuesday.

That was actually an increase of nearly three weeks over 2003-04 when additional spending and staff were directed at the labs because the force was being criticized for long turnover times and backlogs.

Ms. Fraser refused to speculate on the reasons for Mr. Zaccadelli's misleading testimony when she spoke to reporters at a news conference yesterday.

“I think you have to ask the people who made those statements. I have no explanation for that,” she said.

The suggestion that the former commissioner may have misled politicians comes after he resigned for providing false information to the government about Maher Arar who was wrongly accused of having terrorist ties. It also comes as Parliament is trying to get to the bottom of mishandling of the RCMP pension.

See:

Keystone Kops and Air India

ind blog posts, photos, events and more off-site about:
Canada, anti-terrorism act, Government, Liberals, NDP, Conservatives, War Measures Act, 1970, Arar, terrorism, crime, liberalism, state, statism, libertarian, civil liberties
Air, India,, John, Marshall,, RCMP,, CSIS,, Sikh,
Giuliano Zaccardelli, Zaccardelli, , RCMP, Resigns, Arar, Commisioner, Harper, Government, lawandorder, Conservatives, Parliament, MPs, Liberals,